MORE NEWS, 1-19: EU OFFSHORE WIND BOOMING; ROCKET SCIENCE SUN; FIRST AN ENERGY AUDIT; A SHORT HISTORY OF WIND

EU OFFSHORE WIND BOOMING
European offshore wind power market grew 54% in 2009
Paolo Berrino, 18 January 2009 (European Wind Energy Association)

"In 2009, a total of eight new wind farms consisting of 199 offshore wind turbines, with a combined power generating capacity of 577 MW, were connected to the grid in Europe.

"This represents a growth rate of 54% compared to the 373 MW installed during 2008. For 2010, the European Wind Energy Association (EWEA) expects the completion of 10 additional European offshore wind farms, adding 1,000 MW and equivalent to market growth of 75% compared to 2009…"

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"Currently, 17 offshore wind farms are under construction in Europe, totaling more than 3,500 MW, with just under half being constructed in UK waters. In addition, a further 52 offshore wind farms have won full consent in European waters, totaling more than 16,000 MW, with just over half of this capacity planned in Germany.

"In 2009, the turnover of the offshore wind industry was approximately €1.5 billion, and EWEA expects this to double in 2010 to approximately €3 billion…"

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"More than 100 GW of projects are at various stages of planning and could provide enough power to meet 10% of European electricity demand.

"Europe is the world leader in offshore wind with 828 wind turbines and a cumulative capacity of 2,056 MW spread across 38 offshore wind farms in nine European countries. The UK and Denmark are the current leaders, with a 44% and 30% share respectively. In 2009, five countries built new offshore wind farms: UK (284 MW), Demark (230 MW), Sweden (30 MW), Germany (30 MW), Norway (2.3 MW)."


ROCKET SCIENCE SUN
It's rocket science: How SolarReserve is conquering new frontiers; SolarReserve has engineered a killer recipe that is proving all too tempting for utilities. But could an uneven playing field sour its secret ingredients?
Rikki Stancich, 15 January 2010 (CSP Today)

"The brainchild of rocket scientists and a private equity group specialized in renewable energies, SolarReserve, the solar energy development company, is primed to be a winner in the concentrated solar power sector.

"United Technology subsidiary, Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne, has combined its liquid rocket engine heat transfer technology and molten salt handling expertise to develop a unique tower receiver technology with thermal storage capabilities - for which SolarReserve is the exclusive license holder."

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"Another key ingredient is SolarReserve’s founding partner - the US Renewables Group, a US$575 million private equity firm…And finally…SolarReserve’s blend of professionals from the energy, technology and finance industries are proving to be a knockout combination…

"It is little wonder, then, that SolarReserve…[got] the crucial environmental permit…for its 50MW Alcázar Solar Thermal Power Project…[and] two separate PPAs: one with NV Energy for the 100 MW Crescent Dunes facility located near Tonopah, Nevada; and another with Pacific Gas & Electric for SolarReserve’s 150 MW Rice Solar Energy project in Riverside County, California."

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"But [expensive, water-conserving] dry cooling requirements on CSP developers like SolarReserve are placing an upward pressure on the cost of solar power generation – a factor that other power generators are as yet unaffected by…"

Kevin Smith, CEO, SolarReserve: “Why is it that the CSP sector in particular should be limited to dry cooling, when all the other energy projects out there – nuclear, coal, gas – could also be retrofitted to use dry cooling and save orders of magnitude of water over just targeting new CSP facilities? …[T]here is no reason why dry cooling should be mandated for CSP and not for other energy projects. There are hundreds of thousands of megawatts of coal and gas and other energy projects that use wet cooling, and yet nobody is looking at retrofitting existing facilities that currently use a tremendous amount of water…If utilities stipulated that all new projects use dry-cooling, then there would at least be a level playing field for CSP projects…”


FIRST AN ENERGY AUDIT
Energy audit is first step toward 'green' upgrades for City-County Building
Rich Lord, January 18, 2010 (Pittsburgh Post-Gazette)

"There's so much energy being wasted in the City-County Building, Downtown, that you can actually hear it…[In the basement] beneath Pittsburgh's seat of government, steam pipes hiss and drip, sauna-like air whooshes into chilly chambers when doors swing open, and electrical transformers buzz like hives…

"…[An audit of] the 250,000-square-foot building…[revealed] all manner of inefficiency. Start with 220 city-owned air conditioners (not counting the ones in Allegheny County offices in the same building) sticking out from metal-framed windows with duct-taped cracks…the least efficient mechanism for cooling a space…[as well as ] cast iron radiators on some floors, the space heaters under many desks, the mishmash of lighting options, the uninsulated walls, the electrical switching gear installed in 1957 -- all inside an ornate and historic shell…"

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"…[The audit, which will cost] the city up to $120,000, is the first step in a project that will eventually enlist at least $3.4 million in federal funds to lower the $1.7 million-a-year bill for energy and heating in the 95-year-old building…[The report] is due in April, and is a big part of Mayor Luke Ravenstahl's bid to "green" city government.

"The city also is developing efficiency improvement plans for 100 other buildings of the 330 it owns. The city's flagship building, though, will get the first and most attention…The federal energy efficiency grant, like those distributed to Allegheny County and other governments in a nationwide stimulus program, was based on the city's population and area, and will go entirely to the flagship building. At $12 for each square foot in the nine-floor building with two basements and three half-floors, it will get the transformation started, but not finished."

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"The core of the heating system -- which uses steam to heat water which then flows through radiators -- may remain, but the leaky radiators might be replaced with more modern distribution systems…[Big cuts can be made in the] annual heat bill just by changing the temperature of the steam-heated water…Other changes are easier, and could pay for themselves over a few years by shaving the city's utility bills…

"The savings [from many changes in lighting for efficiency, for timed thermostats or centralized heating and air conditioning controls, and motion sensors tied to lighting] can be used to pay for more improvements…[More] grants from the federal government and other sources [could] pay for more fixes…[after investing] $300,000 for less-extensive reviews of 100 other city buildings, from police stations to firehouses…"


A SHORT HISTORY OF WIND
A 5,000 year Look at Wind Energy; History of Harnessing Wind as Renewable Energy
Patrice Campbell, January 16, 2010 (Suite 101)

"From early Egyptions sailing the Nile to Persian windmills to pump water and grind grain, humans have been harnessing wind energy for over 5,000 years.

"Sails and propeller type blades improved the windmill in the 1300's as central European countries began to use wind energy. The pin wheel like horizontal-axis windmills of Holland are still easily recognizable and famous world wide…

Remnant of a bygone era. (click to enlarge)

"The early American colonists relied heavily on wind power to pump water…grind their grain…[and] cut lumber at sawmills. In the 1850's, the Halladay Windmill was developed specifically for the American West by Daniel Halladay and John Burnham…Thomas O. Perry…[introduced] gears to reduce the blade rotation…[allowing windmills to work] in lighter winds…By the 1880's over six million windmills spotted America…with steel blades… built by homesteaders, purchased from travelling salesmen or purchased through catalogs…

"Electricity from wind power via a windmill was first produced in 1888 by Charles F. Brush. The Brush Electric Company…was later bought by General Electric...[T]he Chicago World's Fair in 1893…boasted 15 windmill companies…The Smith-Putnam wind turbine, with blade diameters of 175 feet supplied power to the community of Rutland, VT during World War II…The 1950's saw most of the US windmill companies shut down…until the oil crisis of 1973…

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"As alternative energy sources were sought to combat the high oil prices…NASA, funded by the US Department of Energy [DOE] and the National Science Foundation, developed experimental wind turbines at the Lewis Research Center in Cleveland, Ohio…PURPA, the Public Utility Regulatory Policies Act of 1978, encouraged using renewable energy. In 1980, The Crude Oil Windfall Profits Tax Act made using renewable energy more economically feasible by rewarding businesses using wind power with Federal tax credits of up to 25%.

"…California… took measures to lock into rates using a contract system…[and wind and other New Energies] became more cost competitive…Government incentives and a growing market for electricity during the 1980's…[drove growth]…[T]urbines were inefficient…[but] wind capacity in California exceeded 1,000 megawatts in 1985….More than half of the world's capacity, 2,000 megawatts, was installed in California by 1990 despite the decline of funding for wind power research…The Wind Energy Program of the DOE lowered technology costs in 1995, and the advanced turbine program enabled energy costs of 5 cents/kilowatt hour…By 2004 these costs were down to 3 to 4.5 cents per kilowatt hour…Stronger incentives…were provided by the Energy Policy Act of 2005. By 2006 the DOE had a budget of about $500,000,000…ten times the amount budgeted in 1978."